I was talking with a sock knitting friend yesterday (Hi, Sharon!) and she mentioned that she usually knits her socks top down because she has a high instep and adjusting the heel flap going top down is easily done. Is there a way to adjust the heel flap going toe-up to accommodate a high instep?

This is something I hadn’t thought of before, but hey! Why not?

I pulled out my generic toe-up slipstitch heel pattern (pdf link) and started winkling it. Here’s what I came up with.

I’m basing this on the generic sock pattern I linked to up there. It has 58 (66, 74, 82) stitches around — so you would be working with 29 (33, 37, 41) sole stitches before you start the gusset. If you have more or fewer stitches, you need to adjust to accommodate, like I do in my patterns based on 56 (64, 72, 80) stitches around — I add one stitch in the center of the round after the last gusset increase, then decrease 1 stitch after the heel is complete.

You will start your gusset increases 1/2″ sooner than you do for my regular slipstitch heel pattern (i.e., you will be knitting an extra half-inch of gusset).

Create the Gusset:

Round 1: Work across the instep stitches in your pattern. Sole stitches: K1, M1, knit across to the last stitch, M1, K1.

Round 2: Work across the instep stitches in your pattern. Sole stitches: Knit all stitches.

Repeat Rounds 1 and 2 until you have 55 (61, 67, 73) stitches total sole stitches.

Turn the Heel:

You will now work back and forth on the sole stitches (now the heel stitches) and will not knit the instep stitches while turning the heel. Turn heel as follows:

Row 1: (RS) K37 (41, 44, 48), KFB, K1, W&T
Row 2: P 22 (24, 26, 28), PFB, P1, W&T
Row 3: K 20 (22, 24, 26), KFB, K1, W&T
Row 4: P 18 (20, 22, 24), PFB, P1, W&T
Row 5: K 16 (18, 20, 22), KFB, K1, W&T
Row 6: P 14 (16, 18, 20), PFB, P1, W&T
Row 7: K 12 (14, 16, 18), KFB, K1, W&T
Row 8: P 10 (12, 14, 16), PFB, P1, W&T

You now have 63 (69, 75, 81) heel stitches, having just completed a wrong-side row. On the right side, knit to the end of the heel stitches, knitting each wrap together with the stitch it wraps. Work across instep stitches.

Heel flap: Work back and forth on the heel stitches:

Row 1 (RS): K 45 (50, 55, 60) (knitting each wrap together with the stitch it wraps), SSK, turn
Row 2: SL 1, P 27 (31, 35, 39), P2Tog, turn
Row 3: [SL 1, K 1] 14 (16, 18, 20) times, SSK, turn

Repeat Rows 2-3 until all side stitches have been worked, end having worked Row 2. Turn your work and knit across. You once again have 29 (33, 37, 41) stitches.

This adjustment gives you 6 extra gusset stitches, and the heel flap is worked for 6 rows longer than usual. This will give you about an extra half inch in the height of the heel, unless my math skills suck even more than I think they do.

Speaking of math skills sucking, I have not tested out the numbers I’ve given you here, just worked them out on (virtual) paper. So proceed at your own risk.

About That Shop

Several of you left comments about the shop that is illegally selling my pattern, voicing the opinion that it is unnecessarily “mean” of me to post the name of the shop in my blog.

Well, I’ve emailed them, and I’ve phoned them several times during their normal business hours (as posted on their website). They have not responded to email, and no one has yet picked up the phone, and there is no answering machine. The phone just rings and rings. I find that awfully strange.

In my opinion, I’ve expended enough time and energy trying to contact them and I think no, I am not being “mean” telling you who they are. I have no responsibility to them, and many of you have asked me who they are. I’m not asking or expecting anyone to “do anything” about the situation, apart from avoiding shopping there if you so desire.

Bur I’ll decide what to do when the time comes.

New Sock Book

Thank you for all your kind words about my upcoming book. April 14 does seem like a long time to wait, but think how long I’ve been waiting. I completed the manuscript at the end of February last year. It takes a long time to make a pretty book.

As for as book signings, etc., I’ll keep you posted on all developments.

Lucy Sez:

“Will you be my Valentine?”

I have finalized the Waterfall Socks pattern and it is available here in pdf format. It is linked to from my “Free Patterns” page as well.

And in a fit of efficiency, I’ve listed it in Ravelry, here, so you can queue it if you so desire.

That reminds me, I’ve listed my Sign of Spring socks in Raveltry as well, here. The Sign of Spring pattern is available for sale at The Loopy Ewe, by the way.

About that shop . . .

I of course have had no response from the shop that is selling my free pattern as part of a kit. The reader who alerted me to the situation will go back and check in a few days to see if they are still selling it, and if so, I’ll identify the shop here on my blog, since a number of you asked.

I was wondering if I had misunderstood, but I am told that the pattern looks like it was printed directly from my website and has my name on it, my phot0, and (get this) even my copyright notice.

Giving them a few days to respond and stop selling the pattern I think covers the “Duh, I didn’t know I couldn’t print free patterns off the internet and re-sell them” scenario. Yeah.

Lookie What I Have . . .

This is a real live honest-to-goodness copy of my upcoming book. Publication date is April 14. If I had more than one, I’d give a copy away. Really. But at this point I have just one advance copy — I’ll get my author’s copies in a few weeks.

I am so pleased with how this book has turned out. The phot0graphy is just lovely and I think there’s a little something for everyone in it, sockwise, that is.

Here’s the back cover:

Lucy is so excited she is all a-twitter. See?

It was interesting reading everyone’s opinions of the Twilight books. I can see that I’m not alone in my opinion that they are more or less drech, but I also see that they also appeal to lot of people. No surprise there, I guess. Thanks to everyone who weighed in with an opinion.

It’s only Tuesday, right? Seems like it should be at least Thursday . . .

But hey, look what I finished.

Finally, my poor little Waterfall Sock, knit from Crystal Palace Mini Mochi yarn. That brown blur in the lower left corner of the pix is Lucy’s ear. She was helping.

Look for the free pattern tomorrow.

Speaking of free patterns . . .

This was brought to my attention yesterday by a reader. She went in a LYS and found that they had copies of one of my free patterns in plastic page protectors with a price tag for a kit – pattern plus yarn.

I sent a polite email to the shop, worded thusly:

I was notified by someone who had been to your shop that she saw my free pattern for the Noro Transitions Hat for sale – she said there were several copies in plastic page protectors with a price tag for a kit – pattern plus yarn.

If this is true, please stop selling it immediately. The copyright notice at the bottom of my pattern (posted online at: http://media.wendyknits.net/knit/transitions.htm) clearly states:

“Not to be reproduced in any form without written permission from Wendy D. Johnson, apart from copies for personal non-commercial use.”

If you are not distributing my free pattern and the customer was mistaken, please accept my apology.

Okay, I think that is pretty clear, don’t you? Not surprisingly, I’ve not heard back from the shop.

I’m not naive enough to think this is an isolated instance. I know this sort of thing goes on a lot.

Seriously, I don’t know what is wrong with people.

Lucy sez:

“Don’t mess with my momma!”

I went back to work this morning. I would have liked another leisurely week at home, but work beckoned, so off I went. And I survived the day, though I am very tired now. I guess that should not come as a big surprise.

And I’ve got no knitting content to show you as I am using all my spare time working on something necessitated by the deceit, thoughtlessness, stupidity, and/or laziness of another person. I could add a few more descriptors there, but this is a family blog, after all. Suffice it to say, I am not amused.

Thankfully, there are also good people out there — friends who have gone far above and beyond the call of duty to help me out, so I have not lost faith in all of humanity. Just a very small section of it.

In lieu of knitting content, I’d like to point out two websites that were brought to my attention by a reader. They are freekibble.com and freekibblekat.com. These sites started by a 12-year-old girl and each features a daily trivia question for you to answer. No matter whether your answer is right or wrong, with each answer submitted, 10 pieces of kibble are donated. Since its inception in 2008, over 700,000 meals have been donated to shelter animals.

I’ve bookmarked both sites and plan to visit daily and I hope you will too!

Lucy sez:

“Kibble. It’s a good thing.”

Can Someone Enlighten Me?

A couple of weeks ago I bought all 4 books in the Twilight series, out of curiosity. I started reading them last Wednesday or Thursday while I was home sick and not feeling up to anything with more substance. They are very fast reads — I blew through the first 3 books in no time and I  am currently halfway through the last book.

And I cannot figure out why the heck these books are bestsellers. They are not well-written. The plot is predictable and the characters are pretty simple. Further, I think the main characters are pretty unsympathetic.

Granted, I am not the target audience for these books, as they are written for a much younger crowd. While I believe this is referred to as fiction for “young adults” (one Amazon review rates them for grades 9 and up) I’m thinking this series would appeal mostly to girls age 10 -14. And I think the four books could have been improved by distilling them down to one 250-page novel.

(It does seem to me that the plot could potentially be turned into a decent movie, but of course I haven’t seen the movie.)

What do you think?

Thank you for all your good wishes for my recovery. I think I might live now . . .

I’ve spent the past week felled by the worst case of the flu that I can ever remember having. Still not 100%, but definitely better than I was.

I’ve no knitting to show for myself, for a variety of reasons, one of which is that I couldn’t knit for several days. And I’ve been dealing with other stuff for the past several days, and am likely to have to continue to do so for the next few days.

My poor Mini Mochi sock has not ventured out of its bag in well over a week. But I’ll return to it as soon as I can, and will post the pattern for it after I finish it.

Lucy sez:

“I hope she’s going back to work soon. I’m exhausted.”